Parallax stereogram and process of making same.



No. 7215;567. 7 PATENTED APR. 14, 1903f F. E. IVES. PARALLAX STEREOGRAM AND PROCESS OF MAKING SAME.

APPLIUATION FILED SEPT. 25, 1902.

N0 MODES).

UNITED STATES PATENT OFFICE.

' a FREDERIC E. IVES, OF PHILADELPHIA, PENNSYLVANIA.

PARALLAXST ER EOGRAM AND PROCESS OF MAKING SAM E.

. SPECIFICATION forming part of Letters Patent No. 725,567, dated April 14, 1903. 7 Application filed September 26, 1902. Serial No 124,849. (No model.)

To all whom it may concern:

Be it known that I, FREDERIC E. IVES, a citizen of the United States, residingin Philadelphia,Pennsylvania, have invented certain Improvements in Parallax Stereograms and Processes of Making the Same, of which the following is a specification. A

My invention consists of a stereogram which when seen from a suitable view-point without the aid of any optical device appears in solid ing the two halves of an ordinary double stereogram in superposition upon one surface. In front of this stereogram is placed a transparent-line screen, consisting of opaque lines with clear spaces between them, there being as many clear spaces as there are lines in the photograph belonging to a single element of the stereogram. The line-screen is superposed upon the photograph with a definite separation therefrom, calculated by reason of the parallax of vision with two eyes to make all of the lines belonging to one of the stereoscopic'elements visible to one eye only and all belonging to the other stereoscopic element visible to the other eye only. The result is that when using the eyes asin ordinary vision, from a suitable view-point, the right eye seeing only the lines of the photograph which belong to the right-hand element of the stereogram and the left eye only the lines belonging to the left-hand element of the stereoinches in diameter, 5 is a diaphragm-plate having two small apertures 6 and 7' with a separation equal to the normal pupillary distance of the human eyes-say about two and a half inches from center to center-8 isa linescreen,and 9 is a photographic sensitive plate. Light-rays a: :10, coming from the object 2 through the apertures 6 and 7, are bent inward and brought to a focus at :10 by refraction through the lens 4. Under the conditions-illustrated, with the sensitive plate 9 occupying a plane intermediate between the point an and the line-screen 8, the object 2 will be imaged'on the plane of the sensitive plate by both pencils of rays in juxtaposed lines and in the finished result will appear to be situated at the plane of the photograph; but objects at other distances, such as the chjects 1 and 3, owing to the crossing of the pencils from the two aperturesnot occurring at the plane of the sensitive plate, will form two laterally-separated partial images, as shown by the dotted lines y 3 and will appearin the finished result as if occupying a diiferent plane from the object 2.

The photograph constituting one element of the parallaxstereogram is a transparent positive print 10, made from a negative which may have been produced in the manner described, and it presents two superposed images, one displaced slightly in a lateral direction in respect to the other, as shown, for instance, by full and dotted lines in Fig. 1. This photograph, in combination with its covering line-screen 11, is viewed as a transparency, preferably from the screen side.

The lines of the viewing-screen must be made parallel to'the lines in the photographic image and should have such lateral adjustment as may be necessary to make the elements of the right-eye picture visible to the right eye when held in a plane at right angles to the line of vision, the separation of screen and photograph being such that at the same time the elements of the left-eye picture are made visible by parallax of visionto the left eye. The photographic screen 8 and viewing- ICO ' screen 11 should be identical iucharacteraml preferably with the black lines somewhat broader than the intermediate clear spaces.

The method as so far described is simple and is practically eilicient when the stereogram subtends only a small angle of view. In order, however, that the path of the rays from every part of the stereogram may be absolut-ol y identical, both in photographing and in viewing, the image formed through each aperture in the camera should be laterally inverted, so that the two pencils of light belonging to near objects bisect be ore reaching the screen and the pencils from far objects after passing through it. This may be of fected by placing laterally-inverting prisms in front of the lens-apertures, as shown, for

instance, at 12 in Fig. 4, in which 10 to represent the paths of rays coming from an object more distant from the lens on one side than the screen and sensitive plate are on the other. In thiscase the completed stereogram,

' owing to the necessity for mounting the linescreen facing the film side on the glass in order to get it close enough for correct parallax,

will show the objects laterally reversed; but when it is important to avoid this reversal the object may be photographed in a mirror,

' or Porroprisms or other total-inversion devices may be substituted for the ordinary laterallyinverting prisms. The camera may alse be made perfectly efficient with other For example,

modifications of construction. when the prisms 12 of Fig. tare employed two small lenses 4, as shown. in Fig. 5, may

be placed over the apertures 6 and 7 insteadof the single large lens, the prisms being disposed so as to direct the two pencils or rays toward the axis of the camera in the same manner as the prismatic edges of the single lens, and this method of controlling the parallax independently of the focal length of the lenses possesses certain practical ad vantages. It isalso possible when employing the laterally-inverting prisms to dispense with lenses altogether by making the apertures so minute,

Having thus described my invention, I

claim and desire to secure by Letters Pat- 1. A photograph consisting of a composite image, in juxtaposed lines, of the elements of an ordinary double stereogram, exposed to and transparent lines, so adjusted as to give a stereoscopic elfect by the parallax of binocular vision, substantially asspecified.

V 2. The mode herein described of producing a parallax stereogram, said 'mode consisting View through a screen of alternate opaque in directing separated pencils of rays from r the object through a line-screen onto a sensitive plate separated from said line-screen, then producing a positive image of the object from said plate, and then mounting said positive image behind and at adistance from a viewing screen having lines parallel with those of the image, substantially as specified. In testimony whereof I have signed my name t this specificationin the presence of two subscribing witnesses. A FREDERIC E. IVES.

Witnesses: F. E. BEOHT0LD, I .Tos. H. KLEIN. 

